“Love it. I’ll get my corset out of storage.”
“Can you put it on all by yourself?”
“I may need help,” Kim said and felt her heart beating in her throat. She loved this teasing!
“I would like to volunteer to help you, but at the present I am a conjoined twin. Joe has attached himself to me. Can you bear to have lunch with the two of us?”
“I’d be honored,” Kim said. “If it’s Joe, he wants to go to Al’s Diner.”
“I’ve seen that place and I’m not sure it’s right. Joe specifically said that he wants al dente pasta and steamed broccoli for lunch. And a tablecloth and—”
“Limoges and Christofle,” Kim finished.
“Exactly! See you at the greaseburger at noon?”
“My arteries are looking forward to it,” Kim said and went back into the shop with a big smile.
Carla looked up as she was putting a tray of bracelets away. “Whatever made you smile like that isn’t half as good as what just happened to me.”
“Oh?” Kim asked as she glanced at the trays. The bracelet Travis had admired was gone and so was the ring with the big pink diamond. “Good sale?”
“Tremendous! A man was buying for his mother. He had an eye and picked out the best in the store with hardly a glance. And . . .”
“And what?”
“He asked me to go out with him tonight.”
“Don’t half the men who come in here ask you out?”
“The sleazebags do. And the married losers,” Carla said. “The classy ones like him want you.”
Kim was in such a good mood she was willing to listen to Carla, but the door opened and a very handsome man came in. Not as dark as Travis, and he didn’t have that world-weary look that Travis often had, but this man was gorgeous. And the suit he wore must have cost thousands.
He glanced at Kim, gave a quick nod of greeting, then went straight to Carla.
Standing to one side, Kim watched the two of them. They were an incongruous pair. Although Kim had had numerous talks with her about the way she dressed, Carla’s blouse was always opened one button too far, her skirt an inch or two too short, and she wore too much makeup. The man looked like he’d just left an exclusive club, while Carla . . . Well, there was a lot of discrepancy between their looks.
“I think I’ll take the pearl earrings as well,” he said in a smooth, silky voice as he looked at Carla as though he wanted to devour her.
“Sure, Mr. Pendergast,” Carla said.
“I told you to call me Russell,” he said.
“Will do,” Carla said but continued to stand there staring at him.
Kim went to the far counter and got out her best pearl earrings. Since he’d bought two expensive items, she figured they were the earrings he wanted. A curve like a shell, the pearl embraced by it. She put them on the counter, then nudged them along between the two people, who were staring at each other.
The man turned to her, his almost black eyes looking at her with a remarkable intensity, as though he was studying her. If Travis weren’t here now, she thought, she’d look back at this man. But she just smiled at him in a professional way.
“You’re the designer? Kimberly Aldredge?”
“Yes I am.”
“I’m Russell Pendergast. I’m just passing through town and I had no idea there would be a store of such quality here. Your designs are exquisite.”
His voice and pronunciation spoke of a very good education. Like Travis, she thought.
Behind him, Carla was glaring, her eyes threatening that if Kim made a play for the man, blood might be shed.